


A Living Token

by Lenny9987



Series: Lenny's Imagine Claire and Jamie Prompts [13]
Category: Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-02
Updated: 2016-07-02
Packaged: 2018-07-16 12:11:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7267627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lenny9987/pseuds/Lenny9987
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: Imagine Jamie returns to Craig na dun with some forget-me-nots on his way to Edinburgh shortly before Claire came back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Living Token

Jamie spotted them when he made a small camp for himself one night along the side of the road. They appeared darker in the fading light of evening, more purple than blue—the small spot of yellow at the center like a star peeking from the deepening dark of night. Forget-me-nots. The name came to him quickly and easily though they weren’t a plant he tended to give much thought to usually—crops would be the his first concern when it came to plants, with the ivy that wormed its way into the chinks between stones and weakened walls being a close second. The forget-me-nots were in the category of flower that he generally considered purely ornamental though if he had learned anything from his time with Claire it was that looks could be deceiving. Beautiful flowers could generate a deadly poison and homely shrubs might save your life; it all depended on whether you knew their secrets and how to wield them. Claire did.

He plucked a few of the small flowers to examine them in the dim firelight. It was cool enough in the evenings for him to want that extra warmth though winter was still some weeks away. There would be time to find work and a place to board when he reached Edinburgh. What he would do for work, he didn’t know and at the moment didn’t care; what mattered was getting away from Balriggan.

Marrying Laoghaire had been a mistake. He’d known he would never really be able to let go of Claire but the more time that passed, the fewer people were able to comprehend that inability to move on. Mostly their encouragement that he marry again had been rooted in their fears for him, their longing to see him at least partially restored to the man he had been—the head of a family if not the laird of an estate; the position of a provider and protector instead of being forced to hide or submit. Part of the problem was that they all thought Claire was dead, that his clinging to her memory had passed from understandable grief into something morbid; they didn’t know that she was alive but in a plane of existence—of time—that they couldn’t touch. Of course, for all he knew she _wasn’t_ alive there either but he refused to believe that—found no comfort in that idea.

Still, he _had_ needed something with which to center himself, to give his life a new sense of direction and meaning without Claire… or their child.

It was the lasses—Marsali and Joan—that had probably been the biggest influence on his decision to go ahead and marry Laoghaire… and they were certainly the reason he had stayed at Balriggan as long as he had. They needed a father and he his greatest joys in the last year had all involved those two lasses—teaching them to fish (and watching their initial disgust turn to glee as they pulled in their catch), reading to them in the evenings, seeing the world around him through their eyes. He would miss the pair of them in Edinburgh but the money he would send to Laoghaire would take care of them better than watching and listening to him fight with their mother. They didn’t need to see that and Laoghaire was their mother by birth where he was only a stepfather to them—he had to be the one to leave.

But once again, he found himself alone.

“Claire,” he whispered into the quiet night as he turned the flower around by its tiny stem. Forget-me-nots. No, he would never forget her. That had been part of the problem. Whatever he understood the marriage to be going in—whatever Laoghaire had _said_ she understood it to be—within a few weeks it became clear that it wasn’t enough for her. She wanted more from him than he had left to give. He couldn’t fault her for wanting it—he was her husband, after all. But he’d already given all of it to Claire long ago. And he didn’t want it back—not unless it came with Claire.

* * *

He woke the next morning from a tangle of dreams and memories about Claire and the plethora of advice he’d received since Culloden. He drew his blade, longing for the solid weight of the dirk he used to carry but which he didn’t dare risk losing should he come across a Redcoat soldier. Returning to the cluster of forget-me-nots, he stabbed the blade into the ground around the plant, using it as a spade to loosen the dirt until he was able to pluck a small cluster up with the soil still clinging to its roots. He set it aside before rummaging for some food from his pack and making a quick breakfast of it, then tidied up his camp and remounted his horse. The cluster of forget-me-nots was safely tucked into his pocket.

His plan had been to go as far around Culloden Moor and Craigh na Dun as possible rather than face the memories they held. But now he turned his horse back toward that all too familiar ground. His heart began to pound as the ground rose and the hill became visible in the distance. Though it would take longer to mount the hill on foot, he hobbled the horse outside of the abandoned cottage, resisting the impulse to peer inside. He’d spent two nights there, both with Claire in his arms—the first, waking to the joy of finding her with him when he’d thought he’d never see her again, the second, waking to the sorrow and the _certainty_ that he wouldn’t.

The wind whistled through the leaves of the trees at the outer edge of the stone circle. The hair on the back of his neck rose when he stepped into the circle and realized he couldn’t hear it anymore. The stone was just as he remembered it, split down the middle with a gap just large enough for a person to pass through to the other side. He took a deep breath and touched the stone. It was warm to the touch, probably from the exposure to the sunlight. Next, he moved his hand to the crack and eased it between the stones, reaching through but found only the backside of the stone. Pulling his hand back, he sighed and knelt at the stone’s base, staring at the gap for a few moments as he let his thoughts, prayers, and yearning roam.

He would never forget Claire—to do so would be to forget himself—and he was still relatively certain that she would never forget him either. If nothing else, the child would be a reminder for her. She would never be dead to him so he couldn’t condone the idea of raising a stone for her at Lallybroch but here was a stone to mark where she had passed away from him, a stone where he was comfortable mourning her and leaving something to mark what they shared—a living token that would grow and thrive as their love did, even parted as they were.

He pulled the blade out again and dug at the base of the stones. The soil wasn’t as forgiving as the ground he’d taken them from but after a few minutes he managed to get the cluster of forget-me-nots settled.

He thought to use the water from his flask to irrigate the flowers but knew he would need it for himself as he was still a ways from the nearest stream; he chuckled as the idea of pouring a dram of whisky for the flowers crossed his mind though it would likely kill the wee things. In the end he left the flowers with a silent prayer for Claire and the child, that they might be safe.


End file.
